Riseagainaharrycedricstory
by asongindistress
Summary: Harry potter was falling, falling of his broom because of stupid bloody dementors, to be exact. He can't say he wasn't shocked when the arms of cedric diggory cushioned his fall, and over the rest of the year they form an unlikely friendship.
1. grimdefeat

chapter one

Harry winced as he got hit by the reckless hail on his cheeks, it was that horrible numbness of freezing to the point where you couldn't even feel pain. The snitch gleamed in the storm, juxtaposing the horrid, grey weather. The ball was behind him, he knew that, but so was Diggory, and with the dementors circling up ahead in a storm of misery, he knew he had no chance of catching the snitch. Harry accepted his grim defeat.

As the hooded figures closed in on him, he froze out of fear, he remembered very clearly what happened on the train and he didn't want a repeat, especially in front of the whole school. The dementor was face to face with Harry now, and the pure force of it forced Harry off his broom.

He was falling.

He had never felt so helpless, falling to his probable death in front of all his friends and school, fucking great. He scrunched his eyes shut as he prepared for the impact and inescapable pain of the landing. It never came.

Nervously, Harry slowly opened his eyes. His first thought being, i'm dead. Then he saw the familiar three hoops of a quidditch pitch, where was he? He heard muffled shouting, as if he were listening to a song in slow motion. His train of thought was cut off as he fell unconscious, unaware of the distressed hufflepuff seeker in the middle of a heated conversation with Madame Hooch.

Harry wearily opened his eyes, immediately noticing how drained he felt. His bed in the hospital wing was surrounded by the gryffindor quidditch team, and Ron and Hermione. "How're you feeling, mate?" Ron said, as he noticed Harry was awake. "Could be better" Harry said, cheekily smiling back. "What happened?" Harry asked them all, hoping they would shed light on the confusing situation. "When you were falling because of the dementors, Dumbledore cast this really advanced spell. It was wicked. Wicked, but scary" Fred explained.

It was then that Harry noticed the pile of sweets from all his friends. "Guys, how long have I been in here for?" He asked.

"About two hours since they brought you in" Angelina replied. It was then Harry saw a white envelope under his mountainous pile of sweets, he made a mental note to open it when everyone had left.

"Cedric Diggory kept demanding for rematch from Madam Hooch, something about it not being fair." Wood said, a frown on his face. Harry smiled at the unusual act of kindness but quickly dismissed it when hermione coughed to get his attention.

"Harry, when you er- fell, your broom fell too" Hermione hesitated, then placed a basket of cloth on the hospital bed and inside was Harry's nimbus. Only, it was in pieces, smashed to bits by the fall. His nimbus, a gift from professor mcgonagall, broken. Despair filled him, that had been his first broom, where he discovered the sport that made him feel at home. Quidditch was his passion.

On that depressing note, the group left wishing Harry well, so he was alone. He remembered the card he spotted, he leaned over the side table and shuffled it out from the bottom of the pile. It had Harry on the back in cursive, so he opened the envelope and read the blank card.

To Harry,

I'm so sorry about what happened, dementors are nasty creatures and it wasn't fair that we still won.

I asked for a rematch, but Madame Hooch wouldn't allow it.

Get well soon.

Sincerely, Cedric.

Harry would definitely try to speak with him the next day. The last thing he thought before going to sleep was maybe i wouldn't mind being friends with Diggory.


	2. themaraudersmap

Harry woke up miserable, with the lingering thought of his broken firebolt at the back of his mind he reached over and fumbled for his glasses. Putting them on, the snores coming from the bed next to him and the lumps in two other beds told him that everyone else in his dormitory was asleep, except for Dean - the only morning person out of the five boys.

"Morning, Dean", Harry mumbled as to not wake the others.

"Harry" Dean smiled. He was sat cross-legged on his bed, a black leather notebook in his lap.

"What are you doing?" Harry queried, raising an eyebrow.

"Drawing" Dean said simply, with Harry's furrowed eyebrows he continued, "I've done it for years now, when I need to take my mind off of something or just to simply relax, I pull out my notebook and sketch" He finished with a smile.

"That's really cool, I wish I had an escape like that" Harry replied with a sad smile on his face. It was then Harry realised that he'd never had an actual conversation with Dean, before then it had just been hellos and goodbyes, the obligatory.

With a sigh and the snap of a shutting notebook, Dean got up to go to the shower, with a promise to show Harry some of his drawings at a later date. Harry padded across the dorm and sat on his favorite windowsill - where he usually went when he needed to think. The note from Cedric was still playing on his mind, he didn't have to ask for a rematch (anyone else would've been happy with the win, fair or not) and he definitely didn't have to go to the extent of writing a note and visiting Harry to deliver it. It was one of the nicer things that Harry had experienced in a while, or was it just his hufflepuff nature?

Harry was getting lost in those questions when he noticed a spot of ginger hair in the window, he looked closer and there it was again, behind the aged trees in the forbidden forest. It looked like a tail, dragging across the fragments of rough bark on the forest floor. It was crookshanks; his friend's cat wasn't alone. Next to him was a large black dog, the grim. Now Harry was worried, for the past month he'd been seeing the grim almost everywhere, at Privet Drive, Divination. Harry sat there for another 20 minutes until Ron woke up and they got ready for the day.

Harry, Ron and Hermione were on the way to defence against the dark arts when it happened, Hermione was droning on about the importance of history of magic which was when Harry decided to stop listening. He hated the corridor they were walking down, it reminded him of the previous year with the chamber of secrets and the writings on the wall. Harry looks up to make sure he doesn't walk into anyone when he catches someone smiling at him a couple of metres ahead, it was Cedric. Cedric Diggory was staring at him, first the note now this? So Harry made the logical decision to smile back, Cedric, pleased with the response, gave a node and turned back around to head to his class. Harry couldn't stop smiling in fact for the whole of DaDa.

Lupin asked Harry to stay for a bit after defence so they could talk, this didn't bother Harry as it was his free period next and he had come to trust and respect Remus; so when Remus offered to teach Harry the anti-dementor spell, Harry was overjoyed and more than ready to go. But as Harry was about to leave, he wanted to speak to Lupin about something else.

"Sir, when I was in the hospital wing, the Hufflepuff seeker wrote me a card" Harry explained.

"Cedric?" Remus raised an eyebrow, "Great student, what did he say?" The professor questioned.

"He was just saying how he asked for a rematch and that he hoped I got better soon." Harry paused for a moment, then blurted "He smiled at me, in the hallway." Harry mentally slapped himself, it wasn't even really relevant but he couldn't stop his loose mouth.

Remus smirked at this, then said, "Well, I'm glad he's looking out for you". Harry smiled, relieved to get it off his chest, and said goodbye. As he was about to exit, Remus said, "He'd be a good friend, Harry" with a nod.

Harry dwelled on this for the rest of the day, but it was quickly forgotten over everyone's excitement over the next hogsmeade weekend. But of course, Harry wouldn't be able to go because he had to go and accidentally blow up his bloody aunt.

But then came the marauders map…

Harry was cautiously climbing through the cellar of honeydukes as it was his first time trying the passage. He was making his way out of the back of the shop when he collided with another body, tumbling to the ground and pulling the invisibility

cloak off of him.

"Harry?"

Cedric, shit.


End file.
